


Thirty Years too Late

by hyperbolicfae



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Aftermath of Torture, Gen, Hurt Sam Winchester, Implied Mind Rape, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, M/M, Other, Protective Castiel (Supernatural), Protective Dean Winchester, Protective Mary Winchester
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-07
Updated: 2019-10-16
Packaged: 2020-11-26 11:49:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,770
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20929754
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hyperbolicfae/pseuds/hyperbolicfae
Summary: Mary Winchester has rescued her son. She’s just thirty years too late.OrThe aftermath of Sam’s rescue from the British Men of Letters





	1. Chapter 1

Mary wants to go to him. 

The confrontation with the hunters who refused to call themselves hunters is over, but Sam still won’t look at her. 

This man with stubble and pained eyes who is her six month old baby but not. She squashes down the hysteria that threatens to bubble up. She’s been back two days, has never met him, but has already killed and would kill again to protect him. She doesn’t realize she’s even moving towards him until she feels a heavy hand on her shoulder.

The angel, Castiel, shakes his head and motions towards Dean. Let them have this, he doesn’t say.

Her oldest - not four, not anymore- squats down so he’s eye level with Sam. It sends a wave of nostalgia, of longing so strong she fists her hands and lets her nails dig in. Dean is almost forty, she reminds herself. Sam is tied to a chair and bleeding.

“Okay Sammy,” Dean’s voice is soothing, practiced, “I’m gonna get you untied and we’re getting the hell outta here.” He looks around the room and at the pool of blood at Sam’s feet. “Fucking Brits. Luxury digs this is not.”

Sam blinks. “Okay.”

Dean nods, and his hands go to Sam’s face checking for injury. Fingertips barely tracing bruises and bone, it looks more like a lover’s touch than field medicine. Dean stops at the temples, and for one insane moment, Mary thinks he’s going to kiss him. Instead, appeased, he ruffles his brother’s hair before getting up, knees popping.

“Let’s get this show on the road.” Mary sees the flash of Dean’s knife as he stalks behind the chair and starts work on the ropes. “Christ kid, you think I’m dead for what, twenty minutes, and you go and piss off the neighbors. Thought you were supposed to be the nice one.” He says it casually, but Mary can hear the pride in his tone, “This place is trashed.”

Impossibly, Sam lets out a strangled laugh. “Jerk.” He gasps as his hands are freed. “Doesn’t count if they start it, I only finished their game. Mostly.” His expression turns grim. “How long?”

“Two days.”

“Felt longer.” He thumbs at the palm of his left hand.

“They drugged you,” Sam’s eyes snap to Castiel as the angel motions to the bottles on the table. “It is unsurprising it warped your perception of time.” 

“It messed up a lot of things,” he says warily, his eyes slide over Mary, but then he looks at the ground and falls silent.

“You did manage to break free.” Castiel reaches towards Sam’s forehead, but thinks better of it when Sam flinches away. He lets his hand drop into his coat pocket and sighs. “Sam, permit me to heal you.”

“I’m fine, Cas.”

“Sam, you are obviously not.” Mary can hear frustration bleeding into the angel’s usually placid tone. “I can tell from here your feet are in the beginning stages of infection, it will be too hard to walk.” 

“I’m good.”

“Oh boy,” Dean mutters. “They’re going to do this now.”

Mary doesn’t understand, but Sam glares. “Dean, look I’m fine.”

“Gotta go with Cas on this one.” Dean wipes his hands on his thighs, and Mary just now notices the blood on them. Sam’s blood. “Hey mom, let’s get the car.” He glances at Sam and his voice doesn’t allow for argument, “Cas’ll fix up Sammy up with his mojo, but we’re parked like a quarter mile down. I don’t want his bare feet on the upholstery after trudging through mud.”

Castiel nods, not taking his eyes off of Sam. It’s strange for as violent as he had been before, as willing as he is to hurt people, he’s being strangely subdued with Sam. More what she’d always thought an angel to be.

She really doesn’t want to leave Sam, and it must show because Dean throws an arm over her and leads them up the cellar steps. She blinks at the sudden light and Mary is struck by now normal, how pretty the day is. Her son was tortured for days and nothing about the world changed. No one but Dean, an angel, and her newly risen self noticed. This is not what she wanted for him, for either of them.

She can hear Castiel’s gravelly voice drift up the steps but can’t make out the words. She wonders if he’s pleading.

Dead rakes his hand through his hair. “Just thought we should give them some privacy, you know?” He says in apology. “Work out their shit.” He breathes out and lets the tension he’s been holding show. He looks like he’s aged ten years.

Mary motions to the cellar. “What was that anyway?”

“Look, uh, this isn’t really the place, but Cas fucked up. Real bad, I mean. And Sam’s more … he’s more touchy about it. It hurt him bad.”

“Oh.”

“Look, it’s not my place. It’s just going to be awhile before they kiss and make up.” He shrugs.

Mary cannot imagine a world where anyone would fight angels. “Is that something angels do a lot of?”

“Fuck up? Don’t even get me started.”

It isn’t what she means but she doesn’t want to pry. It’s not her place anymore. When they were babies, two days and three decades ago, she knew everything about them. Now they are men, hunters, friends with angels, and this world makes no sense.

Instead of heading back to the Impala, Dean walks a few feet from the cellar entrance and leans against the house. “Might be a while.”

Mary nods, and goes to sit beside him. She rests her hands on her knees, but doesn’t let her eyes turn away from the cellar. Dean doesn’t either.

Castiel emerges a while later, hands still in his pockets. 

“And speak of the devil…” Dean mutters. 

“I am not my brother, Dean.” Castiel frowns. “That was not a favorable comparison.” 

Dean snorts. “Wish you’d figured that out sooner. Wanna tell me what that was back there?”

“Back where?” Castiel cocks his head and Mary is absurdly reminded of a bird.

Dean squeezes the bridge of his nose. “Cas, we do not let the patients run the asylum. Someone gets hurt and you fix it, not play twenty questions with their feelings!”

“I am aware of how hospitals are run,” he says dryly. “It’s just Sam has lost so much of his agency, I did not wish to add to it.”

And boy, wasn’t that loaded?

Not for the first time since coming back from the dead, Mary feels like an intruder eavesdropping into a conversation she has no right to overhear. She desperately wants to stay, to understand, but her instincts tell her to run. She stays.

“Healing is a hell of a lot different!”

“Is it.” Castiel does not phrase like a question, and his tone sends chills up her spine. Mary instantly senses the otherness of him, and wonders how she ever thought he was human. Castiel looks annoyed, and his all too blue eyes storm. “Are you aware that this is the second time in as many months he’s been tortured?”

Mary’s eyes go wide, but Dean isn’t surprised. He rubs his eyes. “The soul thing, right? Yeah I know.”

“Then you will understand that I didn’t want to do anything that would serve as a reminder.”

“I get it. Look, Cas …” Dean rubs his eyes again “ … did anything else happen. With Lucifer?”

“No.”

“You sure, man?”

“I would have woken as I did when Sam’s life was in danger. I am sure of it.”

“But you don’t really know.”

Whatever Castiel was going to say is cut off by Sam shuffling up to them. He has the look of someone who knows he was the topic of discussion but desperately wants to ignore it. There’s no bruising anymore and his black eyes are gone, but he looks hunted. Mary is hit with the want to hold him, but he’s not her baby and she doesn’t know how. Even with newly healed bare feet, he's no child. He’s older than she is.

“So ah, you didn’t get the car.”

Dean smirks. “Figured you needed some exercise after sitting on your ass.” He clasps Sam’s shoulder, “You good?”

“I’m fine, Dean. Just felt like breaking their toys.”

“Serves em right.” He pulls the Impala’s keys out of his pocket and jangles them in the air. “Here, Sammy, we let you walk and it’ll undo all Cas’s work. Stay here, I’ll get the car.”

Sam nods and watches Dean jog away. He’s quiet for a moment then turns to Mary and looks as if he’s seeing her for the first time. He lets his hair fall over his eyes and looks painfully shy. “You’re really my mom?”

She smiles gently, like when she did when she first brought him home from the hospital. He was so, so delicate. “Yeah.”

“Sorry, about before,” he says earnestly. “The drugs, I thought they were trying something new. A new hallucination, a new story.” He digs his nails into his left palm and scratches. “But Cas explained and this is good,” he breathes, “and you’re real.” 

Mary nods, mouth suddenly dry. When Dean first said Sam was taken, she’d pictured Sam at six months old, still in swaddling clothes. Not a man who’d been tortured.

Castiel looks between the two of them as if sensing the awkwardness. He shrugs out of his coat and hands it to Sam. “Here, for the drive home. I know how sleeping in cars hurts your neck.”

Their fingers brush as he holds out the coat, and Sam’s hand firsts around the fabric as he accepts it.

“Thanks.”

Castiel nods, looking strangely vulnerable without his coat. “I will meet you at the bunker.” 

“I’d like that.”

Castiel smiles. It’s a subtle thing, and she’s sure she would have missed it except for the fact that Sam smiles back. The angel reaches out and captures Sam’s free hand. “I’m glad.”

In the distance, Mary hears the Impala starting up and can see the trail of dust it leaves in its wake. She’s glad too.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> My first piece of writing in over a decade. It was supposed to be about how a new mom from the 80s, with the AIDS epidemic starting, would handle having a gay son. Yeah, so that didn’t happen.
> 
> So yeah, it actually did.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> They’ve rescued Sam, but Mary is still a new mom from the eighties and has the same fears.

Mary is lured awake by the smell of coffee. 

“Morning mom.” Dean beams at her from the table when she makes her way into the kitchen. He holds his mug up to her in mock salute. “Made coffee.”

For an instant Mary stares at the man in front of her and blinks. She tries to push away the feeling of displacement and smiles. “Thanks. Never was a morning person.”

“I remember.” The corners of his lips twitch. “Got you a mug in case you needed it.” He points to a cup beside him with  _ Welcome to Kansas! _ written on it in yellow cursive. 

“More than ever.” She grabs it from the table, but stops at the actual machine. She feels ridiculous but she’s never seen a coffee machine so complex.

“Just press the lever.”

“Oh.”

Dean rakes his hands through his hair. “Yeah, sorry about that. Sam gets pissy about his coffee. Had to have a machine that ‘at least steams milk.’” He rolls his eyes. “I just wanted one that, you know, makes coffee.”

“It’s fine.” She wraps her fingers around the mug and takes a sip. Black coffee is always her breakfast of choice, and she feels inexplicable relief. One thing hasn’t changed.

“If you need sugar or whatever —“

Mary cuts him off. “This is fine,” she repeats. “I like black. Really.”

Dean smiles in a way that says  _ I know that, too _ . It makes her fidget. 

She sits down at the table across from him. “So Sam’s a coffee aficionado?” 

He grins, diffusing the tension. “Practically lives off the stuff. Used to drink black when we were kids, but started on the froufrou in college.”

“He went to school?”

“Stanford.” Dean frowns into his coffee. “It was a while back.”

Mary taps her fingers against her mug. She looks quizzically at Dean.

He sighs. “Look there’s history there. But, yeah. He got in on a full ride. Long story short: his girlfriend died and he left.”

Mary’s torn between pride and heartbreak. She bites her lip. “I had no idea.”

“Sam’s never been good at the relationship thing. They, uh, end up dead, mostly. You should probably ask him for the rest.”

She wants to. She was anxious yesterday when Sam had passed out in the car, after they’d rescued him. She wants to see him, reassure herself that he’s safe. Three days ago she had two children. Now she has a brash, self assured man and his soft spoken little brother. She knows she loves them, but not much more than that.

“They should be up soon,” Dean says as if sensing her thoughts. “Well, Sammy will. Cas doesn’t actually sleep.”

“What’s Castiel doing with him? I thought Sam was healed?”

Dean’s snorts. “You’re kidding, right? Well, I guarantee they are not braiding each other’s hair,” he says pointedly. 

Mary feels dread prickle through her. “I thought he had a girlfriend.”

“He did, but he also… Sammy’s never been …” Dean taps the table with his fingers. “Look, when we were kids Sammy’d always talk about what books a girl was reading, or like, her eyes.” He smiles fondly, and his eyes go soft. “It’s always been about the person for him.” 

Mary frowns. She understands falling in love, and maybe even falling in love with the who of a person, but she remembers the news, the photos of bodies. It was thirty years ago, but to her just a few days passed. It wasn’t safe. Wasn’t healthy.

Her heart shudders in her chest. “But you said girls.”

“Yeah, well,” Dean shrugs. “Girls, guys, angels.”

“Did this start at college, too?”

“Dunno. Probably not. Kid’s always been a walking chick flick.”

“And you’re okay with this.”

Dean’s eyes bore into Mary, trying to puzzle out the line of questioning. His eyes flash, and Mary can feel she’s overstepped. There’s that tangible barrier of then and now, and no matter how they say they want her with them, she feels like an outsider. But the news … the news called it the gay plague and she doesn’t want her son to die.

Dean’s voice is gruff and protective. “Nothing to be okay of. Sure, he’s never advertised anything, but there’s nothing for him to hide.”

“He’s with a man, Dean.” Mary doesn’t understand why Dean isn’t worried. Why he doesn’t see the danger. Alarm bells are going off and Dean is being blasé.

Dean frowns. “You get that Cas is an angel, right? Pretty sure he doesn’t even think he’s a dude, just a celestial wave or whatever.” Dean sweeps his hands over his chest, “The packaging’s just borrowed, and I know he was a chick at least once.”

“Sam could get hurt.”

“It happens, especially in the life. Especially with the things we deal with.” Dean pinches the bridge of his nose. “I still think Cas is good for him. Do I wanna hear about their gay sex life? Hell no. But things are good. Sam’s happy and angels are damn hard to kill.”

Thirty years and it seems like they’re speaking different languages. “Sam’s been with men, Dean. He could get sick.” The rest gets caught in her throat.

Her son’s eyes widen and he rubs his face. “Jesus, is that what you’re worried about? Mom, Cas isn’t going to let Sammy get sick, and it’s not… it’s not like it was back in the eighties.”

Back in the eighties; like she had fallen asleep and woke up to a different time, a different world. “I saw the news. So many people were dying. They had no idea how many.”

“I know, mom. A lot of people did die. You gotta believe me when I say it’s different now. Besides Sam’s always been safe about it.” He frowns, “Kid better have been.”

“How’s it different?”

“They have drugs, I guess.” Dean shrugs. “Look it up on your phone, or ask Sammy. He’d go through everything with graphs and shit.”

Mary’s heart is still racing, but she can accept that her son is with an angel. An angel who can heal him. It’s the most that can be done for now.

“You good?”

Mary nods.

“Thank fuck. We need more coffee and I think we should Irish them.”

It’s nine in the morning but her children are older than she is. One of them is gay, but probably won’t die. It makes her dizzy. “I’m game.”

Dean smiles as she passes her mug to him. 


End file.
